Customer Reviews

Pro Oracle Database 10g RAC on Linux: Installation, Administration, and Performance (Expert's Voice in Oracle)

5 star:		(13)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

This book can easily be used as a college textbook on Oracle RAC. I am studying for the Oracle Certified Master exam and this is possibly the most high level book on Oracle I have read.

It has 3 major strengths which I found to be superior to any Oracle RAC books I have read (including the manual from Oracle).

1)Technical Depth
2)Comprehensive Overview and instructions
3)Quality of writing


1)Technical Depth
The authors write about Linux and Oracle and are high level experts in the subjects. For example, the authors have a very detailed description of how Oracle Cache Fusion handles locking across all the nodes in a RAC environment (probably the crown jewel of RAC technology). They also discuss, in detail, different types of CPU, memory, and storage and contains detailed description of each architecture. Lastly, it contains vast number of "how to" install, configure, change, analyze, backup/restore, and utilize Oracle RAC and Linux.

2)Comprehensive Coverage and Instructions
No small amount of detail has been skipped. The book contains every utility (there are many) provided by Oracle to implement RAC. It provides a good step-by-step coverage of Linux and Oracle RAC installation as well what each step is adding to the RAC environment. To top it off, it adds how to performance tune, administer, troubleshoot, backup/restore, and use Dataguard in a RAC environment. I can't think of a subject on RAC which the authors did not cover.

3)Quality of Writing
I was pleasantly surprised how well written this book is. Although far from a Pulitzer Prize material, it certainly belongs in that category amongst the Oracle books. Every praragraph has been well organized and written. The proofreader of this book deserves major praise for their work.

There are two approaches to learn about a new application. One is the traditional one - what a typical User Guide does - start with general overview and then methodically cover every little subject. The other way - think about a FAQ - brings you up to speed quickly by answering the most common questions, however the coverage maybe spotty.

This book is a hybrid but on a high level it's more a FAQ than a comprehensive user guide. It tells you the most common things you need to know about Linux, SAN, hardware and RAC. It requires some prior knowledge and doesn't teach you about Oracle or Unix very basics.

In general, this book would be perfect for someone who has some experience with Oracle and Unix but either lacking RAC or Linux knowledge and trying to fill in those gaps quickly. In my case it was an ideal book - I had some experience running older Oracle on Solaris and this book would let me catch up on RAC and Linux specific issues.

This book also is a nice quick reference to keep on your desk if you need to find a commonly used command or file.

The book is not a complete reference as I stated above and gives only a few most typical samples for the most typical situations. It also shows some age and a lot of recent developments are missing (just a few examples: RHEL5, ocfs2 support on x86_64 and a lot of other things are missing) however because it is focused on the mainstream features and examples, most of the material will stay relevant for years to come.

Also, despite the lack of depth, the authors are trying to give you some rules of thumb and show you some right directions about what is good practice and what is not. A lot of guides and references provide you with endless options to choose from and leave you more confused than empowered. Here the authors are leaving the secondary details aside and try to bring to your attention what is really important and that's exactly the difference you would expect to see between a vendor technical guide and the professionals sharing their real life experience.

Overall, if you're looking for a certification prep material or planning to become a professional DBA you probably need to read more books and this one is not the best to start with. But as a quick crash course to give you some working knowledge you can get by with quickly - this book is really good.

I was reviewing information about Julian Dyke, his presentations and publications are very good in general. This book in particular has interesting chapters like "Trace and Diagnostics" and "RAC Internals". It's not easy to find books with internals because this information in general is restricted. In my opinion is not for beginners, you need to have an Oracle background. I would highly recommend this book if you are an Oracle DBA working or starting with Oracle Clusters & Linux

Jose Valerio

I am not a DBA, but I support several systems with various databases. I picked this book because I needed to get up to speed on Oracle RAC in a hurry. Even though I'm working with it under AIX, all of the concepts and core components are the same. This book was filled with the information that I needed and did so in a logical fashion. I was mainly interested in the clustering components and the book gave good descriptions and examples. This book enabled me to look at the systems in my environment and quickly figure out how it was configured and what state the various clustering components were in. I think the book is very readable and also makes an excellent reference. Again, I primarily do system administartion and clustering, but this book gave me a solid understanding of how RAC works which enables me to better understand the DBA's requirements and what the system requirements are for a RAC environment. It also helped me in determining proper kernel tuning parameters.

I have done a few RAC installations and this book taught me a lot of things that I did not know. I was able to quickly read through the book. The book is well written and easily understandable for a new DBA who wants to familiarize with the concepts of RAC. The "10g" will stop me from buying this book and reading it. It is well worth the money.
Thanks for a fantastic book!

Step by step guide for installing 10g RAC on Linux. Continue to use it as a reference when installing 11g RAC on Solaris 10 since the utilities are all the same.

Most of the RAC books focus only on RAC. This one covers ALL the aspects from network, server (CPU, memory, IO interface, NIC ...), storage, OS, Oracle and beyond. THE book you need for deploy Oracle and/or RAC.

Many books around Oracle's advanced topics simply parrot the manuals. Julian avoids that. Instead, he describes Real Application Cluster technology from the ground concepts up to full implementation, with practical notes and tips. He gets into topics that the manuals never touch, and much of what he writes can be useful in any RAC environment, not just Linux.

I whole-heartedly recommend this book and own both the paper and eBook version which I often reference.

This book delivers what it promises. It contains a great balance of technical detail,examples and theory. It encompasses all aspects of implementing/maintaing 10g RAC on Linux.

Very well written. No mater you are a Pro or a newbie, it will be helpful. A very well written book.


Highly recommended.